Headphones for mixing

  • Thread starter Thread starter Mo-Kay
  • Start date Start date
I love headphone mixes, escpecially the muddy part. I use them to get a better feel for where my imaging is being placed.
 
Blue Bear Sound said:
That's because many novices/rookies don't know any better and keep asking why they aren't getting their mixes to sound right whne they attempt to mix with headphones.........!!
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(...)

I guess I'll stop repeating myself now.
 
If you have to use headphones for mixing then watch out. Alot of headphones have a bass and treble boost to make the listening experience more pleasurable like a stereo system. Sennheiser are good headphones. I master my mixes on sennheiser HD200 which isnt the best bu thats all i have. I find that it is hard to judge the lo and high end. I find that panning is fine when using headphones its just getting used to it really.
 
I'm an apartment dweller too, and I had to sell my Yorkville monitors last year. What I do now is mix on my cheap AKG cans, which I also use for listening to music, and then burn it on a throwaway CD-R and take it to the car. I make a list of what changes I want and then go back and fiddle. I would prefer to have a set of monitors in front of me (those BX8s at MF are calling my name, but alas, money, space, and noise issues hold me back) but it works out OK for the time being.

I have a pair of HD-280 Pros as well, but I find that mixing with them gives me poorer results than my cheaper cans.
 
my advice is to use headphones that do not close around your ears completely. That way you arent tricked into cutting back your low end too much. The headphones that close around your ears push alot of bass, so when you listen back through a boom box or car stereo, you might find it sounding kinda thin.

I still would just turn down your monitors chuck the headphones, or at least reference them once in a while just for a differnt sound perspective and let your ears ajust to a lower volume. You may find you'll get a better mix that way.

I have also noticed that headphones can through you off when adding effects like reverb and modulation effects. The effects in the headphones will sound much "wetter" vs the "dryer" sounding through your monitors.

yep
 
Headphones are probably my main problem in mixing

I cant seem to put them down. I am in an apartment too and I have some really difficult neighbors let alone they think I am crazy. But I just find the seclusion of headphone addicting. I even hooked headphone into a small pair of powered speakers on my mixdown computer rather than listen to the speakers.

I do have a FLAT pair of Audio Technica headphones that were expensive and are dead flat. I dont like them becuase I am simply addicted to these Sonys.

Would the FLAT Audio Technicas work good for me? Maybe they would work good for the thread starter too. They were like $150 I think.
 
nonreversebird said:
I do have a FLAT pair of Audio Technica headphones that were expensive and are dead flat.
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They may be from a spec point of view, but when attached to YOUR ears, they certainly aren't.... as I mentioned in my article, everyone hears headphones differently.....

nonreversebird said:
Would the FLAT Audio Technicas work good for me?
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The same problems I illustrated would apply, so no.....

It's not impossible to mix with headphones, but the learning curve for translating mixes from headphones to speakers is huge........!
 
Wouldn't you say the same thing that applies to monitors
"Listen to a lot of commercial CDs that you know really well to get used to them"
applies to headphones too, Bruce?
 
Mo-Kay said:
Wouldn't you say the same thing that applies to monitors
"Listen to a lot of commercial CDs that you know really well to get used to them"
applies to headphones too, Bruce?
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It's not the same at all... simply because speakers are not coupled to your head as headphones are. The room acts as a response "leveller", making what people hear more similar than with headphones.
 
Blue Bear Sound said:
It's not the same at all... simply because speakers are not coupled to your head as headphones are. The room acts as a response "leveller", making what people hear more similar than with headphones.
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That doesn't anwser my question...that's just you repeating yourself about why you (almost) can't mix on headphones.


The way you were putting things one would think that:
You hear the sound of record A and mix record B accordingly...
isnt that why you are saying mixing on headphones is ALMOST impossible?
 
Mo-Kay said:
The way you were putting things one would think that:
You hear the sound of record A and mix record B accordingly...
isnt that why you are saying mixing on headphones is ALMOST impossible?
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Uh no.... I'm not sure where you came to those conclusions, but it wasn't from me..... If you derived that from my article, then you really misread or misunderstood it!

Basically , the big difference between hearing with speakers vs. headphones, is that each person's response to hearing with headphones is unique. So no one hears the same sound via headphones the same way. Speakers are much less "variable" from person to person since the room acts as a buffer.

Essentially headphones mixing is a moving target from person to person, speaker mixing is not.
 
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so what you are saying is: not being able to get good balances on headphones rules out the possibility of A-B comparison mixing?

(By that I mean: checking your mixes next to songs with the same sound you are trying to achieve)
 
Mo-Kay said:
so what you are saying is: not being able to get good balances on headphones rules out the possibility of A-B comparison mixing?

(By that I mean: checking your mixes next to songs with the same sound you are trying to achieve)
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As I said, it's not recommended that you mix with headphones, but it's not impossible either.

Learning to translate mixes on headphones is much more difficult because of the uniqueness of the listening environment. Certainly, one of the ways you can attempt to translate is by A-B comparisons (just like when learning monitors), but I think you'll find it's not as easy as it may sound.
 
You people crack me up...why ya giving Bear a hard time...hes telling ya the friggin truth...you dont mix in headphones....ever...no one does...never ever ever ever....so why do it...unless you want to be a retart....just do it with monitors....its not that hard.
 
Janesaid2me said:
You people crack me up...why ya giving Bear a hard time...hes telling ya the friggin truth...you dont mix in headphones....ever...no one does...never ever ever ever....so why do it...unless you want to be a retart....just do it with monitors....its not that hard.
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*sighs* read.
 
I use to think "don't mix on headphones" was stupid too, until I stayed up all night (literally) one night getting a mix perfect on HP's, doing A-B's, the whole nine yards. Put the mix up on monitors after all the roommates were up the next day and was utterly disappointed. To make things worse, instead of just starting over, I tried to fix it. Basically I just chased my tail for 2 days, at the end of which I had lost all objectivity. Ever since then I will never mix on headphones.
If it works for you do it, but we're just trying to save you the frustration.
 
I totally agree about mixing on headphones... it's just plane too hard to get it right. But I'm currently in the situation of not being able to afford some monitors as yet. Maybe in 6 months? *shrug* So my question is in the meantime, are there any suggestions as to a cheap short term solution for speakers to mix down on? My current solution, (which is ok... but a bit of a pain in the ass), is to mix on a pair of cheap PC speakers. They have a bass and trebble control, so I try and make the sound as flat as possible on those. Then I try and get the best mix possible with the crapp sound they put out. It actually kinda works. Though every time I get a mix I then test it on as many stereos as possible... the car... kitchen boom box... loungroom stereo... etc etc. Then go back and do it all over again.

Does anyone else have some budget short term solutions?
 
I use headphones to hear the dynamics of a mix "AFTER" I've mixed it on monitors. I can tell where I need to compress more then I pull the cans back off.
 
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